Salon Rising: The Podcast

tRANSCRIPT 

So how long have you been with Timely for now? Nearly three years. Mm-hmm . With Timely. And what took you onto that journey? Yeah. So you were, were you when you were working with a brand?

Mm-hmm . Were you a educator or a rep? I was doing both. Both. I did a dual role. Again, doing both passions. Mm. I'm a creative, I'm a, yeah. At the end of the day, the core soul of who I am, I'm a hairdresser. Mm. Hands down, I can talk it still. I love it. I still thrive on scrolling on Instagram and seeing the most beautiful work.

Mm-hmm . And I don't think I can ever lose that. 'cause I understand that DNA of a hairdresser through and through mm-hmm . And so for me, moving into starting at Timely, I wanted to talk about business differently and the importance of understanding software and what it does for you. And again, having that story of my own understanding of, oh, reports, numbers, and then realizing sometimes I was scared to look at the numbers, petrified.

Software is a vital part to your business. Vital. And it's there to be the backbone for you. It is like your little assistant that is there to help you. Yep. And so moving into You don't know how, what it, what it ever looks like. How do you push yourself? Yeah. You know, like Yeah. If you're If you're If you're working out, you're working, like you're like, I'm going to get really fit, you're going to see it based on what your body looks like.

If you don't look at the background of it, how are you ever going to know that you're improving? It's the same with your figures, your figures have to, like the figures are going to tell you everything you need to know. Where is your rebooking at? Where is your retail at? Where is this at? Because when I'll say to somebody like, where's your retail sitting?

And they're like, uh, I'm like, cool figure you haven't looked at. But if you look at. every single week. If you assess it, if you know how to push it, you know how to change it, that's what makes massive the 1%, 2%, 3 percent changes in those things is what's overall in a 12 month period going to change everything.

100 percent and you know there's some really scary statistics out there. Go. The average solo business. Um, it's the part of where hairdressers are moving into, they all want to work for themselves. They all want to have freedom. They want to do their thing. But what are you doing to understand how to run your business?

and learn those tools. And we need. Because there's this assumption that oh I'm just going to make all this money because they don't understand any of the numbers and any of the background stuff. And we. What it actually costs to have that. And it's crazy when we do solo and we work with solo artists.

It's crazy. You know, like people just go, well, I'm making this in a salon, so I'm just going to, I'll make that on my own. It's like, yeah, but like, you don't have that concept of how much you're actually being paid when you work for somebody, when you have everything put back in, when you put four weeks holiday, two weeks sick leave, your wage, your tax, your super, all of the extra, all your commissions and bonuses, everything that you get out of that space.

It's actually amazing. Without having to pay for any of the stuff. That you used in that space. It's huge, you know. So that, even just that, when we first break down that, people are like, I can't afford to pay myself this every single week. Because you might have big weeks over Christmas where you're thriving.

But what happens when you take two weeks off after Christmas? You know, so it's like, When people go, I can't afford to break, pay myself that every week. I'm like, well that's why you're going backwards because you're paying, you're giving yourself that. And you're putting anything else away and you're never, and people like that.

Oh my fucking god, I don't know if I'm, and that's why it lasts like 10 months because you know, I think there's this huge thing of like being just not working for someone, not working for someone, not working for someone, but at the end of the day, I think there's always going to be, like, and I think, But you are still working for someone, you're working for yourself, you still have to work for, you still have to work.

I think salon owners think it's just going to go that way and it won't because people, there is a big amount of people that don't want to work like that. Yeah. They don't want to work the way that we work as business owners and they are the people that we need to be inside our businesses and to take care of so that they want to just do, you know, they, we take care of them and our business can thrive and they don't have to do all of the extra shit that we do.

But I think it's this interesting thing that I think it's for, I totally agree, I think there will always be a place for both, but I think we have to be aware of ignoring that this is happening. Mm-hmm . Because there are businesses and companies that are ignoring that is happening.

I experienced that. Mm-hmm . It's like, but it's just me. Oh, we can't look after you then, ah, you know, so, and I want to know the numbers and I want to be able to do the reports and I want the things to be able to automate for me, because I understand it. There needs to be a market for that as well.

Absolutely. And it's like, how does everyone just acknowledge it and support it regardless of what your opinion is? Yeah. Because the solo, hairdresser can get very lonely, which is why a lot of, yeah, someone rising the solo hairdresser is something we knew that as we started to do this work, it has to be both absolutely has to be the solo artist and it has to be the artist that has staff like it has to be both.

Not one or the other is. And actually not even just the hairdressers, because I find that even the solo hairdressers seem to have more of a collaborative union because I say hairdressers. I shouldn't say hairdressers because in our industry, it's, it's, yeah, it's a hair and beauty industry, but I feel like beauty can be even more so isolating if you're working on your own because it's that very isolated, you know, like not like in a co sharing workspace where you're bouncing off other people, you are like.

In your own little room, in your bubble. It can be really isolating if you don't have those communities and connections and support. Agreed. Because what happens when someone hates, doesn't like something, or you don't have someone to bounce off. And no one understands except for other people in our industry.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think too, I've been, I talk to a lot of business coaches in my partnerships role. And a lot of them say that, people come and get a coach when their business is failing. Yeah. Why did you wait till the end?. Correct. Correct. And I think if I could tell my younger self, I would have got a coach when I started.

Yep. Why? Like, I so would have, that would have been an ideal scenario of like, okay. And to just have someone that accountability. Because people even now say, well, I just can't afford it. We're like, I get it, but you're going to be able to afford it less if you don't. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So it's like, if you get sick, well, when I get sicker, when I'm on my death bed, that's when I'll go and have the surgery, Jen.

It's like, I feel sane. Stop yelling at me. When I'm dying, when I'm absolutely dying. And I can't move my back. And I can't, I'm almost not living. I'll get the surgery then and then I'll think, Why the fuck didn't I do that sooner? Which is exactly what Jen did. She doesn't want to do that anymore. It's all about teaching everyone from lived experience.

True. But it's the same when it comes to the finances. It's like when, one day when I finally get on top of things. You're not getting on top of things unless someone teaches you how to get on top of it. Unfortunately. Unless you do something radical, at which point we know with our money stories, we need someone to teach us and to learn and to help guide us into that.

You know, sometimes it's therapy, sometimes it's strategy. But do you know what it reminds me of? It's like this whole marriage counselling concept. It's like, you know, the whole, we have, uh, Brenda next client who does marriage counseling who has spoken to us about the fact that people rock up and it's too late it's like you needed to be here so much sooner like if you were here you know but he talks about it being like A car where you have to constantly be working, like just constantly have those like touch and you know, like just be constantly working on it, making sure that everything's going smoothly and you guys feel good.

Don't do it when the car is literally like falling everything out of the bonnet about to blow up because you can't come back from that. It's time for a new car. That's what we do to ourselves. Yeah. Like we go through life, you know, life crises, and then we hit a point where we're like, Oh, shit.

Yeah. And I always say to myself, and I do this every single morning, how am I going to show up today? Yeah. Who, like, check in, how am I showing up for everyone around me and myself today? Yeah. And that helps you navigate. So much. Because you also can see when you, I do that also the night before, because I can also see where I go out of my body the next day.

So for example, for me, I've got five kids. So for me in the mornings when I'm doing the kids, if I'm not up and onto it before my children are up, I am a psychopath. I'm yelling at everyone to get their stuff done because I'm not done. And now I'm overwhelmed. So this morning I was like, last night I was like, I can't start this week off on the back foot.

So when you say show up, how are you showing up for yourself and other people? I'm like, I actually have got to be up at like five 30 and I've got to get, so when the kids came in. I was like, a light to see them. They were like, Oh, you're awake. And I could like, enjoy my morning with them. And I had a plan on the fridge for this morning.

And I, when I left the house, I was like, guys, we did good this morning. But if I, if I'm in control of that, and we're in that in our businesses and our lives, looking at like that, you basically life reported yourself is what you did. You know, you took all the information that you had, you looked at the report and then you proceeded accordingly.

Yeah. I was like, if I don't. That was my retail check, you know. I've got to sell retail. I've got to make sure my kids go get bread. Like, I wrote it down. I had water written on my list. Did I drink it? No. I was the one who did that. I'm going to drink some water today. Um, but I think that we can see, like you said, looking at it from the outside, you're like, that goes hectic because of me.

So I can blame everybody else for this issue. Or I can actually look at it from the outside and be like, oh. Um, if I can reflect on why everything goes to shit and, and change things, I can adapt it and change things as well. So I think it's in life, in business, you know, if we can sit back and reflect and be like, well, if I actually knew my numbers or if I actually got support or if I actually found someone or listen to something, or I delved into a podcast, it doesn't always have to be coaching.

We talk about it cause we do it for a living. But. Yeah. Absolutely. Do something about it, especially going into 2025. If you're there and you think I could get lower and you want to increase, you want to, as you said in the beginning, if you want to thrive, instead of just surviving, you have to make change.

There has to be, and someone generally needs to teach it to you.